Yesterday a quasi-judicial body in Italy fined @Cloudflare $17 million for failing to go along with their scheme to censor the Internet. The scheme, which even the EU has called concerning, required us within a mere 30 minutes of notification to fully censor from the Internet any sites a shadowy cabal of European media elites deemed against their interests. No judicial oversight. No due process. No appeal. No transparency. It required us to not just remove customers, but also censor our 1.1.1.1 DNS resolver meaning it risked blacking out any site on the Internet. And it required us not just to censor the content in Italy but globally. In other words, Italy insists a shadowy, European media cabal should be able to dictate what is and is not allowed online. That, of course, is DISGUSTING and even before yesterday’s fine we had multiple legal challenges pending against the underlying scheme. We, of course, will now fight the unjust fine. Not just because it’s wrong for us but because it is wrong for democratic values. In addition, we are considering the following actions: 1) discontinuing the millions of dollars in pro bono cyber security services we are providing the upcoming Milano-Cortina Olympics; 2) discontinuing Cloudflare’s Free cyber security services for any Italy-based users; 3) removing all servers from Italian cities; and 4) terminating all plans to build an Italian Cloudflare office or make any investments in the country. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. While there are things I would handle differently than the current U.S. administration, I appreciate @JDVance taking a leadership role in recognizing this type of regulation is a fundamental unfair trade issue that also threatens democratic values. And in this case @ElonMusk is right: #FreeSpeech is critical and under attack from an out-of-touch cabal of very disturbed European policy makers. I will be in DC first thing next week to discuss this with U.S. administration officials and I’ll be meeting with the IOC in Lausanne shortly after to outline the risk to the Olympic Games if @Cloudflare withdraws our cyber security protection. In the meantime, we remain happy to discuss this with Italian government officials who, so far, have been unwilling to engage beyond issuing fines. We believe Italy, like all countries, has a right to regulate the content on networks inside its borders. But they must do so following the Rule of Law and principles of Due Process. And Italy certainly has no right to regulate what is and is not allowed on the Internet in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, China, Brazil, India or anywhere outside its borders. THIS IS AN IMPORTANT FIGHT AND WE WILL WIN!!!

here is a graph showing that Helius is making the network faster than anyone else in existence, btw we get the most slots and do not delay the network, so we end up speeding up the network disproportionately the Helius validator is also now on DoubleZero faster

Anyone can run a solana validator. A person can make the calculation (Cost of solana validator + cost of txs on solana for household) vs (cost of ethereum validator + cost of txs on ethereum for household) Because solana txs are so cheap, due to the increased capacity of the network, there exist as set of users that can’t afford Ethereum but can afford solana validation. There is no marvelous proof that the cost of an ethereum node is optimal. It’s purely subjective.

.@heliuslabs will be voting yes for Alpengflow faster

Every. Millisecond. Matters. Learn how LaserStream uses ultra low latency shreds to deliver on-chain transaction data faster, and gives you a more competitive edge. Don’t just keep up with Solana, stay ahead of it.